fe only. They took nearly three hours to do it in, but the wager
was for six, so they won that. They killed him at last in Rosamund's
Pond, having driven him in there with stones. I could well believe this
latter tale, and that the thing had been done in the king's presence,
having seen what I had at supper two nights before.

* * * * *

When we came into the Great Chamber after supper all was ready for the
dancing; and Mr. Thompson, who was the Hormead schoolmaster, and a
concealed Catholic--though he went to the church with the children and
did teach them their religion, for his living--was at the spinet to
which we were to dance. There was a fellow also to play the fiddle, and
another for a horn.

The dancing was very pretty to see; and we did a great number, beginning
as the custom is, with country dances; and it was in the first of these
that my Cousin Dolly did dance with her father, and I with Dolly's maid.
We were all dressed too, not indeed in our best, but in our second
best--with silk stockings, and the farm men and the maids were in
their Sunday clothes. But each one had put on something for the
occasion; one had a pair of buckled shoes of a hundred years old, and
another an old ring. My Cousin Tom and I wore our own hair, and no
periwigs. My Cousin Dolly was very pretty in her grey sarcenet, with her
little pearls, and her hair dressed in a new fashion.

It was all very sweet to me, for it was so natural and without
affectation; and it all might have been a hundred years ago before the
old customs went out and the new came in from France, in which men pay
dancers to dance, instead of doing it for themselves. The room was very
well decked, and the candles lighted all round the walls; and when some
of the greenery fell down and was trodden underfoot, the smell of it was
very pleasant. A little fire was on the hearth--not great, lest we
should be too hot.

We danced country dances first, as I have said; and then my Cousin Dolly
shewed us one or two town dances, and I danced a sarabande in her
company; but then as the rest of the folk liked the country dances the
best, we went back to these.

Presently I saw my Cousin Dolly go out, and went after her to ask if she
needed anything.

"No," said she, "only to get cool again."

"Come into the parlour," said I; and made her come with me. This too had
a couple of candles burning over the hearth, and a little fire, for any
who